Living Strider
by PawsitivelyFanfic
Summary: Dave's apartment burnt down... Whoops... Now him (and his Bro) are both living with you... Oh gog. (Dave x Reader x Dirk, probably)
1. The Burning of the Strider Dwelling

"Dave. Why are you here. It's 12 a.m." You rub your eyes, and halfheartedly glare at him.

"Most ladies like this attention. Besides, it's urgent." He says, stuffing his hand in his pocket.

You facepalm yourself and sigh. "Dave, did your brother kick you out again?"

"Actually, that's not the case this time."

"Seriously. Let me sleep. You know I get bratty on low sleep."

That earns a chuckle. "Just let me in, would you? It's freaking important."

You pinch the bridge of your nose, contemplating the situation. Dave wants in at 12 in the morning. He says it's urgent. "Dave! I have been asleep for literally one hour. I have had one hour of sleep in the last 12 hours. It is too early for you to go around asking girls to come in their apartments."

"I do this all the. Ladies love it."

"DAVE!"

Taking his hands out of his pockets, he lets them hang by his sides. "Let me in, [Name]."

"Not until I know what the heck you want."

"Our apartment burned down."

"Dave, you are not being serious." You huff impatiently.

"Our apartment literally burned the heck down."

Your eyes widen. "At 12 in the morning. No, Dave, your dwelling did not burn down."

Dave rolled his eyes from behind his shades. "You can see the damage from your window."

Crossing your arms, you raised an eyebrow. "I'll bet ten dollars you're lying."

"I'll bet ten dollars I'm not lying."

You make another disapproving sound and stomp through your small apartment to your window. Scanning the cityline, you find the huge building Dave's apartment is in.

Holy crap.

The entire top floor is missing, and the second highest floor is severely burnt. Oh yeah, and the flames are still burning things. "DAVE, WHAT DID YOU DO?!" You scream.

"Heh." Dave is leaning on your sofa, having snuck in to your apartment when you ran to the window. "It wasn't me. Bro left the stove on and it caught fire to one of those creepy smuppets."

"YOU BURNT DOWN A WHOLE TWO FLOORS!" You pause. "Why are you here? Shouldn't you be with your Bro or something?!"

"Oh yeah, we're staying with you until the apartment is rebuilt."

"WHAT!? DAVE, IT'S MY APARTMENT! I -"

"Oh yeah, and you owe me ten dollars too."


	2. The Death of Lil' Cal

You sit on your bed, holding a cardboard box full of stuff. Glancing around, you look for any more stuff you could shove in the box. You made sure everything was neat (what a surprise - your apartment was usually an organized mess) since you were going to have guests for the next... Month? Several months?

Why did you agree to this?

Oh right - you didn't.

Sighing, you cram some unnecessary object in to the box. Making your way over to your closet, you hold the cardboard cube awkwardly with one hand while opening the door. Shoving the brown box in to the mess of clothes, you lean back, propping your hands on your hips.

Pondering, you wander back in to your kitchen. You took a stray spoon off the table, and put it in a drawer. The closest drawer available.

Now I'll spare you from all the boring details. You wondered why you cared so much about tidying up; you've been to the Strider residence a few times. It was anything but clean. Maybe you had a minor crush on the younger Strider; maybe not. Reader-chan is not telling.

Crashing on to your couch, you feel tired. Really tired. Maybe that was a side factor of being woke up at 12 FREAKING A.M. - or maybe you've been marching around your apartment for the past half hour while Dave and his Bro got his stuff.

Suddenly the door slammed open, and you bolted upright, making a panicked sound. Gog damgit, [Name], it's only Dave! Getting up and sprinting to the door, you survey the situation.

Dave has a duffle bag. His Bro has a box. "Show us to the food, [Name], we're both starving!" Dave says.

You roll your eyes. "No one eats at 1 a.m."

"Oh come on. I totally do."

"You'll eat any time of the day!"

"Only if it's Doritos."

Growling under your breath, you walk in to your kitchen, beckoning the Striders to follow you. Leading them in to whatever room you had a sofa in, you stopped. "This sofa is a pull-out, and I have a inflatable mattress since you two clearly aren't comfortable sleeping on the same couch." You say.

Dave flings down his duffel bag on the couch. "I call it."

His Bro takes the bag and throws it over his shoulder. "No way dude, I am not sleeping on some cruddy inflatable mattress."

The younger boy grabs it and runs back over to Bro. "No way. I totally called it."

"Don't make me restrict your food privileges again."

This makes you pipe up. "I can restrict food from both of you! It's my house, idiots!" You shout, quite exasperated.

Both Striders turn to look at you. "Woah, [Name]. Fierce." Bro scoffs.

You raise an eyebrow and smirk. "Never doubt the ladies." You point at both of them. "Now, you two, get unpacked and settled in."

Dave salutes. "Yes SIR!"

"Can it, Dave." Walking out of the room, you shut the door (even you forgot to shut it.) Opening your fridge, you try to find something to eat. You suppose Dave could eat... Soon.

Of course, you were interrupted by a scream coming from the other room. Running over, you surveyed the... Damage...? "What happened that was scream-worthy? I see a puppet limb. How is that scream worthy?"

Bro turned to you. "You wouldn't possibly understand. Lil' Cal... Is dead. I found this arm in the wreckage."

Dave closed his eyes and put is hand over his heart. "He had a long, happy life."

You furrowed your eyebrows in confusion. "Isn't he the pupp-"

You were interrupted by Bro. "He was more then a puppet. He was friend and a family member."

"He couldn't even tal-"

"Get your black clothes on, [Name], we're going in to mourning."


	3. Reader-Chan Refuses to Mourn

You shifted uncomfortably in your itchy black pants. You hated them, absolutely LOATHED them, but they were the only black bottom you owned. Dave and his Bro had forced you to wear them (they held you down and tickled you), as apparently everyone had to go in to mourning for Lil' Cal.

That creepy puppet. You were glad he was dead.

The three people in the apartment were gathered around the stuffed limb. Dave and Bro were being unnaturally silent and motionless, and you felt reeeeaally awkward. Shifting your weight from leg to leg again, you bit your lip.

You opened your mouth to say something, and a finger pressed against your lips. You stared down at it for a moment before pawing it off your mouth. "What was that for!?" You hissed quietly.

"[Name]. We're paying respect to Lil' Cal."

"I can see that, but I'm bored to the freaking moon and back!"

Bro huffed and turned back to the puppet's appendage. The stuffing was oozing out.

And while all of this was happening, Dave was staying still and silent.

It creeps you out how obsessed these people are with inanimate objects.

You decided after several seconds you would try to sneak away and home that Dave's Bro wouldn't karate chop you to death.

Shifting your feet carefully, you made sure your socks gliding over the carpet made no sound. Bit by bit, you inched away from the circle.

Although you proceeded to swiftly be tripped my Bro, and squeaked in surprise as you fell. You managed to catch yourself at the last second but dang it hurt your hands.

You got up and brushed yourself off. "What's the deal?!" You snapped, quite agitated.

Dave FINALLY said something. "Yeah, Bro, that was uncool." It was quieter the normal though, but you didn't have time to wonder why.

Huffing, you tuned around. "Just don't forget this is MY apartment." You walked toward the door and opened it, letting the lights from outside rooms fill the room Dave and his Bro were in. They just stood there.

Stalking over to a sofa, you sat on it and curled your legs in to your chest. You wrapped your arms around them and rested your cheek on them. You stayed like that for at least a minute before the sofa shifted as Dave sat down next to you.

"[Name]?" He whispered. "I'm sorry about Bro. He's just... Pretty torn up about the puppet thing."

You chuckled, a forced, flat laugh. "It's ok. I just hope rebuilding your apartment doesn't take too long." It was a thickly veiled insult.

"..." Dave looked at you for a moment, then got up and went back in to the room he was staying in.

As the sofa shifted again, you felt kind of lonely. Your apartment was full of people but you felt more detached then you'd ever been. Ever.

A/N - so things changed a bit for Reader-Chan! I still don't quite know how I'm going to resolve this conflict, but it's about 4 a.m. in the story and she hasn't gone to sleep. So...


	4. Author's Note Updates (Important!)

So, woohoo! An author's note!

I'm going to be discontinuing all my fanfictions on this website, as I've moved to a wattpad account. I'm going to be moving a few fanfictions - including this one - and storing/continuing them there.

Here's the link to the wattpad account - user/drizzleti

homefully I'll be able to see you guys there!


	5. Waffles

(A/N - Hey guys! As you may know, I was trying to transition a lot of my writing to Wattpad. But, it turns out Wattpad isn't really home to the type of authors I'd like to be part of a group with. So... I'm back! Sort of! I still have school and stuff to worry about so updates will be slow on all of my stories, and... Yeah! c: )

You woke up pretty slowly, your eyes finally opening as the sun was suddenly shone right in them. Being still pretty grumpy, you grumbled under your breath and sat up, trying to shield your poor eyes.

Judging by the position of the sun in the sky, it was not early. In fact, you heard a muffled discussion from the kitchen.

"Dude! Bro! You're gonna burn the waffles, take them out!"

"No! They're fine, chill."

"I can see them burning!"

You exhale and begin to shift off the couch, but stop as something soft brushes against your arms. You pause and now notice that an orange blanket - in fact, it looks like Dirk's signature color - is draped over you, the soft material brushing against your skin. You were fine in your tank top and pajama shorts, as it was summer, but it was pretty nice of whoever to give you a blanket while you were sleeping.

Or a little bit creepy, but whatever.

You stood up, pushing the blanket on to the couch and beginning to stretch. The boys' bickering had died down, but you felt like they were going to burn something other than the waffles if you left them alone. Or stab each other with forks. Or something.

You strode quickly across the small living room in to the small kitchen. Dave was bent over looking in to your oven, which, judging by the brightness inside, was cooking the waffles. Dirk was opening the freezer, a box of frozen waffles in hand.

"Oh, [Name], you're up," he commented as you entered the room, "we just sort of raided the fridge and made some breakfast. Hope you don't mind." He then shoved the box in to the freezer and turned, reaching for some oven mitts on the nearby counter.

You snorted, finding it sort of annoying and sort of funny (but mostly annoying) that both brothers were really making themselves at home. "It's fine, just ask me if I'm not asleep." You resisted the urge to snap at them, but the slight guilt you felt over last night's melodramatic situation stopped you. But, you warned Dave. You get bitchy on low sleep.

"The waffles are burning, Dirk, geez! Take them out." Dave interjected, standing up and gesturing towards the fridge.

Dirk rolled his eyes and grabbed the oven mitts, walking towards the fridge. "Fine. But I'm telling you, they're not burnt." He proceeded to open the oven, revealing some crispy and slightly browned - but not burnt - waffles, as you looked on from behind.

"Told you. It's those stupid shades you're always wearing." He boasted, smirking.

Dave raised his eyebrows. "You wear shades too. Maybe you're too ignorant to realize your own crappy ways." He shot back, an almost identical smirk plastered on his face.

They threw around a few more insults as you turned around to grab some paper plates from the cupboard. "My gosh! Calm down. They're _waffles_." You interrupted, setting the plates down on a small table in the corner. _Boys, am I right?_

Dave smirked once more and approached the table as well, while his brother pulled the waffles out of the oven brought them over.

The rest of the breakfast continued without a problem, really - the three of you shared some pleasant conversation over the waffles, most of which had been piled high with whipped cream and/or waffles - again, they were really making themselves at home.

Once you were done, you leaned back in your chair, your eyes wandering around the room. They quickly found the clock... And after reading the time, you freaked out.

"Crap, I'm late to work!" You all but screeched, flying to your feet.

You _did_ have a job at a cafe - and even though you worked with coworkers that shared your shift, you couldn't just skip work. Even if you had two boys at your house that had burnt theirs down.

"Cool, I'm coming with." Dave replied nonchalantly, grabbing his plate and standing up.

"Dave! You can't just come with me to work!" You retorted, grabbing your purse, which had been hanging from a nearby hook.

He chose to retort, "Watch me - you work literally walking distance from your apartment."

You continued to argue with him, Dirk eventually jumping in to the conversation - in favor of coming to work with you, of course. You ended up bickering with the two far longer than you should have - you just about died as you stole a glance at the time.

"Fine! You can come to work with me. But I _swear_ , one wrong move and both of you are out."

Both of them seemed satisfied with this.

It was going to be a long work shift.


End file.
